Weeks 24-26: Left Wing

I am now officially 6 months into my build! I am almost done with the second wing. Since the last update I have finished the pitot and AOA lines, installed the top skins and fit the wing tip.

Since the fittings for the pitot tube are very close to the top skin I decided to wrap them with insulation tape. I folded the tape so the sticky sides were against each other, the zip tied them to each fitting.

I also wanted the lines to be more secure, but without permanently attaching them in areas that will be inaccessible. After consulting with my technical advisor, I decided to use zip ties on the inboard rib and inside the pitot access area to keep the lines taught between them. This seems like it is working well.

Once that was done I was able to install the top skins. One thing I did differently this time was to put the landing and taxi lights on their bracket before installing it. This was much easier than putting them on after the leading edge skin restricted access. I did have to be careful to keep the now heavy bracket supported until the skin helped secure it.

The next step was to remove the wing tip twist jig and install the end rib and wing tip. This time I decided to only cleco the end ribbon until the tip was fitted. This way I could remove it to install nut plates for the trailing end of the fiberglass tip. Once those were on I riveted the rib in place, only having to drill out about 4 rivets before realizing I forgot to put the last rivets in the spars.

I am waiting for more nut plates before I can finish the wing tip, but I was able to fit the light in place. This wing tip didn't have any pre-punched holes for the light, so I took multiple measurements on the first wing tip to match them as close as possible.

With the end rib in place, I was able to install the rear skin support. On the first wing the ends of the rivets were scratching the flap assembly, even using the shorter rivets. I decided to change to using solid rivets to attach the top skin to the support.

Since the hole diameter was fixed by the pre-punched holes, I was not able to get a rivet the perfect length for the thickness of the parts. It probably would have worked as is, but I decided to shorten the rivets by about .030" to get the length within the recommended range. This only takes a few seconds on the deburring wheel, and the results are good. The formed end of the rivets are about 1/3rd the height of the pulled rivets. When I get the right wing back out to work on the fuel tank I will replace those rivets as well.

After finishing the wing tip and building the left flap, I will be ready to go back and hopefully get a sealed right fuel tank.